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Let's make quality the norm again

forbrukerradet.no

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Re: Let's make quality the norm again

#441

Post by account42 »

abyssin wrote: post #407
sholladay wrote: post #109

One big problem is that prices are easy to compare, while quality is not. I recently bought a tub that was advertised as stainless steel on Amazon. I was suspicious but decided to take a chance. Turns out it is galvanized, not stainless. I’m not sure the average person knows the difference. To be charitable, perhaps that’s even why the listing advertised it that way. But the difference matters significantly in terms…

A simple indicator for quality should be the return rate by brand. You need two things: a law that offers a long enough warranty, and a public registry of returns where customers can check that their return is listed.

Companies will just release "new" products and discontinue the old ones faster than you can see that they are bad.

Re: Let's make quality the norm again

#442

Post by Coeur »

xingped wrote: post #158
jolt42 wrote: post #150

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think 10x is quite rare. Quality ends up actually curtailing costs to some degree (eg. fewer returns, cheaper marketing - word of mouth). Buy a Weber grill, I had 2 grills before my Weber that lasted 3 seasons between them. I bought the Weber at about 2.2x the cost of the bargain grills and 17 YEARS later it's still going strong, built like a tank. Saved a lot not buying more cheapo grills.

Yes, this is quite common and is usually referred to as "it's expensive to be poor". That said, unfortunately these days it's very difficult to know which brands are still actually quality anymore and which are the ones still coasting on previous good engineering reputation while currently shipping substandard crap to make an extra buck for the bean counters in charge before the ship sinks.

The problem here is an information imbalance between seller and buyer.

This could be solved via regulation (unlikely to happen in the US).

Another solution would be independent testing labs / publications. To stay independent, they can't finance themselves using ads. Would people be ok to pay for information, on the internet? For $1000 lawn mower maybe, what about for a $50 kitchen appliance?

Re: Let's make quality the norm again

#443

Post by account42 »

kqr wrote: post #78
myrmidon wrote: post #49

I personally see two effects that are very detrimental here: 1) "Quality brands", where you pay a premium to get high quality/durability products, are economically incentivized to "sell-out" (cash in the brand name by producing as cheaply as possible). This is because customers take some time to catch on, and short-term financials are too often more important than anything else. 2) Increasing trend towards no-name pr…

> Quality brands are economically incentivized to sell-out [...] because customers take some time to catch on, and short-term financials are too often more important That probably happens a lot, but there's another mechanism by which it could happen, that requires no malice: the brand gets a quality reputation, which increases demand for its products, and they are unable to produce quality products at the rate needed…

> Then it's easy to reason that it'd be a net benefit for everyone to loosen the quality requirements a tiny bit, in order to satisfy the demand of more customers.

No, that's not easy to reason. People are buying because of the quality and selling them anything less is malice.

Re: Let's make quality the norm again

#444

Post by bborud »

pif wrote: post #88

Quality was never the norm: cheap always beat quality with a hand tied behind his back! Western working class has spent decades complaining about cheap imports from China... while feeding that market with their own money. Western frequent fliers keep reminiscing about the grandiose pre-deregulation era or air travel, but cry a river when their low-cost carrier of choice actually enforces the limit on cabin baggage. E…

Quality was the norm when people had little or no disposable income and expensive things had to last for a lifetime, and some less expensive things (like shoes) had to last years.

Quality was what you judged products on and the origin of brands.

The overwhelming majority of brands today are meaningless because they have nothing to do with quality. They are either status markers or tools for exploiting our tendency to form habits.

You need go no longer than your local hardware store. Almost all the consumer grade electrical tool brands today are from perhaps 2 manufacturers. But you are likely to have a preference that you tell yourself is grounded in a rational, informed choice. Except, it mostly isn't. You probably buy the same toothpaste every time. Not because you have done an exhaustive study of toothpaste and concluded it is the best one for you. But because it is what you are used to buying.

(Yes, there are still some professional tool brands that make their own electric tools, but the kind of stores consumers shop in don't have those since they cost an arm and a leg)

Yes, quality used to matter. A lot. But most people alive today have not lived in those times. People have a hard time imagining things that are outside their own experience. So much so that they can even conclude "it can't be if I haven't experienced it".

Re: Let's make quality the norm again

#445

Post by eru »

mitxela wrote: post #436
eru wrote: post #368

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Claude was just an example. You can use an open source model or even run it locally.

They are subject to exactly the same enshittification factors. How much would you pay DeepSeek to train their model to always say you make the best clothes?

Once an open weights model is published, you can keep using that model (with exactly the same sha256 hash). It's hard to be sneaky.

Re: Let's make quality the norm again

#446

Post by [deleted] »

jdw64 wrote: post #396
eru wrote: post #375

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The world economy has never done better in absolute terms. I'm not sure where all those hard times are that I keep hearing about year after year, virtually independent of how well the economies are actually doing.

It's a K-shaped economy, after all. From the way you talk, you seem to be upper class. Usually Singapore is centered on elite schools and technology for certain families, and just from the fact that you can go into the English-speaking and IT industries, it seems to me—based on this conversation—that you're basically upper class. You're probably connected to Lee Kuan Yew's family. Singapore itself is a standard Engli…

[deleted]

Re: Let's make quality the norm again

#447

Post by mitxela »

eru wrote: post #445
mitxela wrote: post #436

Earlier quoted context omitted.

They are subject to exactly the same enshittification factors. How much would you pay DeepSeek to train their model to always say you make the best clothes?

Once an open weights model is published, you can keep using that model (with exactly the same sha256 hash). It's hard to be sneaky.

So you don't plan to ever use any open model newer than 2025?

Re: Let's make quality the norm again

#448

Post by iamnothere »

AnthonyMouse wrote: post #404
iamnothere wrote: post #299

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I wish more brands would follow the Newman’s Own charity model. All profits go to charity, so there isn’t an incentive to hollow out the brand, and the products are a reliable quality at a decent price. Apparently they set up an organization to help other people do this: https://100forpurpose.org/

The general problem with this is that starting a business generally requires money, which for-profit companies get from investors. For a non-profit to do it they need to get it from donors, and then your actual complaint isn't that nobody is willing to start a company that works that way, it's that people (e.g. you and your friends) haven't donated enough money to make it happen. But something that might be interesti…

Yes, it’s difficult to start companies like this for the reason you mentioned. Most companies that follow this model come from a singular founder/donor who is interested in charity.

I do like the suggestion of building a charity that spins off nonprofit companies.

Re: Let's make quality the norm again

#449

Post by spjt »

I think there is a bit of survivor bias here. People like to say "everything is shit now, I've had this item for 20 years and it still works." But that's because they can see that 20 year old item, not all the shit they bought 20 years ago that broke and they got rid of.

Re: Let's make quality the norm again

#450

Post by abyssin »

account42 wrote: post #441
abyssin wrote: post #407

Earlier quoted context omitted.

A simple indicator for quality should be the return rate by brand. You need two things: a law that offers a long enough warranty, and a public registry of returns where customers can check that their return is listed.

Companies will just release "new" products and discontinue the old ones faster than you can see that they are bad.

That's the idea behind doing the thing at the brand level, not the product level.
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